[PatrickHenry]

The irrational brigade has managed to toss your excellent thread into the smokey backroom. Never fear. The intellectual value of this thread will persist. I shall henceforth vigorously point out the intellectual connections between Adam Smith, Charles Darwin, and the Founding Fathers. If the creationists squeal, it's because their totalitarian worldview is exposed for all to see.

[Rightwing Conspiratr1]

The irrational brigade has managed to toss your excellent thread into the smokey backroom.

Well I would imagine the smoky backroom is the closest category on FR to burning sulpherous pits of hell. ;-)

[jennyp]

The irrational brigade has managed to toss your excellent thread into the smokey backroom. Never fear. The intellectual value of this thread will persist. I shall henceforth vigorously point out the intellectual connections between Adam Smith, Charles Darwin, and the Founding Fathers. If the creationists squeal, it's because their totalitarian worldview is exposed for all to see.

The thread is dead. Long live the thread!

[RightWingAtheist]

Along the lines of the connections between evolutionism and capitalism, has it ever frequently crossed your minds, as it has mine, that of all political doctrines, conservatism, at its most basic, is the one most analogous to evolution? True conservatism is not the mindless reactionarism or passive complacence that its detractors and, nor is it as simple as "Standing athwart history, yelling Stop". It aknowledges that change is inevitable, sometimes even desirable, but also that it is gradual, and that we cannot escape continuity with the past. Moreover, there is a process of selective adaptation in the course of history, where we preserve those traditions and values which have proven themselves to be beneficial to both the individual and society, cast off those which are harmful, and are skeptical of those mutations, the fads and personal indulgences passed off as "lifestyle choices" and "alternative perspectives" which try to overtake tradition and insunate themselves into the mainstream.

Conservatism also views both human nature and its products-our societies, our cultures and and our institutions- as parts of a natural order following certain laws, and while we can use our knowledge to ameliorate our condition, we cannot re-engineer society based upon our always limited understanding (something which Von Mises emphasizes in Theory and History. Contrast that to what calls itself "progressivism" today, which assumes that people are all products of their environment, that culture and society our all constructions, and that they are infinitely malleable, and can be restructured according to a desired ideal, and you have an approach which resembles a bizarre melange of intelligent design and Lysenkoism.

For your further edification, feel free to peruse the links section of my FR homepage (shameless plug, I know), which I've filled mostly with pro-evolution conservative and libertarian sites. This includes, surprisingly enough, Little Green Footballs, whose webmasters are pro-evo, and while they don't post as regularly on the evolution/creation debate as we do, and whose threads on the subject make ours look tame. If any of you have other suggested sites to add, please do so.